Albums: Dwelling of Duels: Forest vs. Jungle Month (May 2025)
Macadamia Woods
Game(s): Final Fantasy X
Reviews
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The flute is played so well but it’s so loud it sounds like the rest of the band is maybe 10 feet away while you play this flute directly in front of me like Ron Burgundy playing jazz flute in front of a bar patron from the seminal Will Ferrel film Anchor Man.
The vocals are similarly very dry but sang very well and I appreciate them immensely. I love the arrangement a lot – it just has some space confusion. I would recommend checking out the vibes on a song like Woman in Chains by Tears for Fears for how to fill a space and reverbeberate lead instruments so that it’s not so distracting
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The flute playing here is lovely. Ensemble vocals! I really the interplay between the soft and hard instruments – we have flutes and choir that are in front of lead electric guitars.
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Wow very nice track. This one has a ton of potential to be spectacular but the flute and the singer aren’t sitting in the mix as well as I’d like, which is a bummer because they’re the main attraction. That lead guitar near the end could come up a little too. The arrangement and performances are great though. Love the harmonizing flutes. The bass has a great tone to it. Overall great piece, just needs a little bit of mix polish.
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That clean guitar tone is superb. Once the rest of the instruments come in, the mix feels very unbalanced, the rhythm guitars are kinda quiet and maybe even too dirty for the style. The woodwinds, while well performed, really stick out in the mix, they’re very loud and not very well compressed, which makes it feel less like a part of the song and more like it’s just sitting on top of it. The arrangement is solid and does interesting things, in particular I really like the instrumentation, but the mix could do a lot more to hold all these things together. Vocal performance is actually kind of incredible. I also really like the sound of the drums. The fact that some instruments sound really good while others don’t glue at all makes the whole thing feel really unbalanced for me.
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Nice clean guitars to open up before getting the splash from the drums. Yet more flute here, and it comes in well (almost maybe a bit too loud) against the backing instruments – enough that I initially missed the backing vocals. Can definitely hear some nice touches of auxiliary percussion in the back. Then nice shift to having the vocal soloist come in, very good range and tone from her. Backing vocals could still come up a touch here too, but they are more prominent than compared to against the flute. Drums are well balanced here, and the counter melody from the lead guitar also cuts through – but the rhythm guitars and bass could come up a bit as well. Very nice resolution of the chord to end – great job anon!
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Again! Again! No complaints from me. I like the clean guitars, they sound really great. Oh nice, live flute. And some “ooo’s”! Love the harmony on the lead guitar at 1:30ish. OH nice, vocals taking the melody now!
So my main critique here is that the levels of the instruments are unbalanced. The flute is very forward, as are the lead vocals. That’s the right choice to make, but the individual tracks need compression to even everything out. I think compression on all the individual tracks would help this mix a ton. The choir at the end also has to be tuned to get the intervals sounding as nice as possible. Melodyne is a great and cheap-ish tool for this, and I’m sure there are free options as well.
Overall, cool arrangement that will be really highlighted by balancing.
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Flute is lovely but it’s very loud and dry and at times the backing vocals clash a bit pitch-wise (not sure if with each other or with the flute). For my taste, I would’ve tried to pan the backing vocals more and push them back with a reverb for a nice, wide “bed” for the lead flute and vocals
The lead vocals are stunning and the drum sound is very nice and appropriate for the style. Rhythm guitar gets a little lost in the mix.
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Same source, different approach! More of a soft rock take here. Flute and vocals enter, there seems to be some notes clashing (maybe some of the voices are a little off-key?). Volumes are kinda all over the place as well, flute is loud as hell while the distorted guitar is barely there at all. Around 1:40 there’s a very impressive vocal solo, but I’m still not feeling the backing ones, tunings don’t seem well aligned to my ears.
Overall, I see a ton of potential on this one but right now it feels a bit undercooked… Mix is unbalanced and I’m pretty sure some notes sound off.
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